My Splendid Mirage

I took these photographs in Manhattan. Their subjects are the banal details of daily life, and they have been photographed many times by other photographers. My goal, however, was to photograph the streets of the city like a jazz musician interprets a well known standard. Often the song is well known, but the musician still attempts to transform the song into a unique personal statement. In a bittersweet essay F. Scott Fitzgerald once referred to Manhattan as “my splendid mirage”. That’s an apt description, because as I walk through its streets I often feel that a definitive understanding of the city’s complexity is forever beyond our reach.